Set Tour

Kaleidoscope Effect - Test

Band Bio Plan

Magazine Creation

After conducting research, a lot of research into various magazine covers, Phoebe began work on the magazine cover. Initially attempting to create it using publisher, she found that it would not allow her to manipulate the layout the way we wanted, and imported photos at a low quality, making them appear blurry. After deciding that Publisher did not allow her to create something that carried through our band's image and synergy, Phoebe decided to look for a different software on which to create our magazine cover.                          She eventually found a website called CANVA, which provided a blank canvas and allowed her to change the deisgn and layout as she pleased. The images loaded in high quality, and we were able to create something that suited our band image and that we were both happy with.

Album Songlist

The list of songs me and Phoebe created for our album:
TUMBLEWEED
CLOWNS MAKE ME CRY
SEAGULLS
3000
SEQUINS
PINK HEARTS
CACTI
NOT TODAY SATAN

Permission Letter

In order to ask the band's permission to make a music video for their song "Spinning Wheel", I tweeted Black Honey from my personal Twitter account. Black Honey didn't reply but they did acknowledge and "like" the tweet.
https://twitter.com/ahmayzinglucy/status/933712400506908672

Merchandise Feedback

The feedback for the merchandise displayed on our website was mostly positive, with good notes including:
- Good variety to choose from - t-shirts, bags, patches etc
- Looks like it is good quality
- Portrays the band's image well
- Lots of design options (includes both Lucy and Phoebe)

Constructive criticism included:
-Perhaps just keep to the band's main colours of pink and black
- List the pink and black t-shirt options before the white option

Digipak - First draft

This is the first draft of our digipak, which I created on PowerPoint - I used PowerPoint as I felt it was a programme I was more comfortable using than PhotoShop or similar programmes.
I used various photos promoting the band's bright and grungey image, taken during filming and on other occasions. For example, the top right photo was taken by a friend during a visit to the cafe and museum, God's Own Junkyard. We thought the neon lights and pink tones alongside the heart-shaped glasses used during filming worked well to suit our aesthetic. I cut out and layered another photo from the same location over Phoebe's eyes, which was a detail I really liked and thought added something extra to the original image.

Magazine Research

When choosing the image for the front cover of our magazine, I personally referenced i-D magazine and wanted to use something with bright colours and an artistic vibe. This suits our band image as our target audience are people who would buy i-D over another magazine such as Vogue or OK! magazine.

When choosing the design and layout for our magazine cover, we chose to follow the design of offBEAT magazine. It is a fairly minimalist design, with key information and a tagline printed on the front cover, alongside a photo of the main subject.

Website Research

This is the official website for indie-rock band Glass Animals. Their image is quite eccentric and vintage, and relies a lot on imagery and colour.
This home page has a slot machine style, and pressing on the "PUSH" option shuffles the photos and shows the user more images from various photography archives or behind-the-scenes images of the band.
The current style of their website is different to their old one, as it is currently modeled on their newest album "How To Be A Human Being". The colour scheme and vintage theme all reflect the album art, allowing the band to maintain a very current and fresh image.

Clicking on the menu link (the three lines) brings you to this page, which has six other pages to click on.

Clicking on the "LIVE" link directs the user to this page, which shows Glass Animal's upcoming tour dates. It also provides a link to sites where fans can purchase tickets to these events.

The store link shows various items of merchandise, including badges, vinyls, t-shirts and tote bags.

Clicking on the "MUSIC" link takes you through to the band's Spotify page and a link to a playlist made by the band - this is a good idea as it allows fans to connect more with the band and share music with each-other.

The "VIDEO" link shows users the most recent music video made by the band, and gives you the option to watch their other recent videos.

Website - Merchandise

For our website, Phoebe created eight pieces of merchandise that would promote our image as a band and appeal to fans. Taking inspiration from various artists, the items created include two phone cases, two tote bags (which have become increasingly popular as band merchandise) and four different t-shirts.

The items all have images of either me and Phoebe or our logo, which helps to promote our group further.

Digipak feedback

This is the first completed version of our digipak - it includes photos from on and off set, with four taken by Phoebe and myself and two by my friend and amateur photographer Niamh Darby.
Feedback from peers was overall positive, with it being noted that it is unique and attention grabbing. One suggestion was to tint the bottom left photo pink in order to better match the other photos, but this was not a common note for others.
A classmate noted that the synergy was good and as a whole is very eye-catching, and that they liked the grainy film effect on all the images. They reminded me that I need to include the production notes, borders between photos and possibly a message to fans on one of the images.
More feedback noted the good synergy and consistent colour scheme. Additionally, many showed a liking for the bubble photo, as in my opinion it shows the artist more and is a welcome break from the kaleidoscope imagery.

Props research

Props used:
Glass bottles - We initially thought we would have to buy some bottles solely to place them around the living room for Phoebe's scenes, however upon searching my house I found enough bottles for us to use. I did buy one bottle for the glitter-bottle smashing sequence, which costed £2 from Hobbycraft. The glass bottles are intended to give a sense of
Glitter - I bought two pink glitter shakers from Hobbycraft, which we used for a small scene in which I blow glitter towards the camera, and another one where Phoebe smudges glitter over her face. I planned to put the rest of the glitter in the glass bottle, but could only find one shaker. However, I found enough glitter and sequins in my room to use, which I think worked better as we had more colour variety. Glitter is an important part of our video, as we are aiming for it to be as colourful and fun as possible.
Magazines - We found multiple newspapers and magazines throughout my house, and for the two large stacks in the living room scenes I found a collection of music magazines we could use.
Clothes - I used various items of clothing in order to make the living room appear messy and uncared for, which fitted the "bad-girl" image for Coco
Cacti - The song itself has clear Western themes, with the usage of a flanger effect on the guitar and various instruments. We decided to hint at this by incorporating cacti into the video as decoration around the living room.
Microphone - This was used during the green screen room filming, and is used by Bee (myself).

Website - Second draft

This is the second draft of the homepage of our band's website. We changed the background to a simple pink and only used kaleidoscope for Bea's (my) introductory photo. We also added a bio, talking briefly about our band members met and how can't sleep came to be.

Magazine cover - feedback

The main feedback from our teacher is:
*Make Lucy's image stronger - take out red eye, brighten the image, make her the main focus
*Make the background less grungy - brighten
* Make the text look more professional
*Add a bar code

Marketing Research

This is my Prezi presentation researching into the various methods of marketing used by bands and artists.

Website - First draft

This is a screenshot of the website Phoebe created for our group, "can't sleep".
Our original plan was to continue with the kaleidoscope theme and carry it through the website as the main images - however, it was noted that while this would contribute to our band's image and synergy, it looked too messy and needed some variation.

Magzine cover - First draft

This is the first draft of our magazine cover, featuring myself as Bea on the front page, using a photo taken at home with me partially in costume. We wanted to use this photo as not only does it look interesting and candid, but the bubbles are bright and colourful enough to be considered as linking to the psychedelic imagery of our band.

My Performance Inspiration

When preparing to film my scenes as Bea, I mainly referred to this video of Black Honey performing Spinning Wheel, the song we use for our video. I found this really helpful in characterizing myself as Bea as watching the way Izzy Philips (the real singer) lip-syncs and moves around provided the inspiration I needed to create the slightly wild and very intense character I intended to portray.

Ellie Rowsell (lead singer of Wolf Alice) in the music video for "Yuk Foo" also provided as an inspiration for my performance - Yuk Foo has an infinitely more angry vibe than Spinning Wheel, which I tried to incorporate into my characterization as I wanted Bea to feel like someone who could essentially kick off at any moment - this linked directly to how the screams throughout Spinning Wheel come as a shock and juxtapose the Western feel of the song.

Performance Research

In order to properly prepare for our performances as our characters Bea and Coco in our music video, me and Phoebe watched some other music videos and took inspiration from the artists shown.

A key part of a music video is the singer's performance, which can make or break the whole thing. A boring performance would not be attention-grabbing enough to maintain the audience's interest, therefore the artists must make sure they perform in an exciting manner.





An example of good performances is this music video from the band Slaves - like our band, they are also indie-rock, and their style is almost aggressive, often coming very close to the camera and shouting the lyrics.





Indie artist Grimes also provided a lot of inspiration, particularly for my music video persona. Her own character has a slightly deranged feel, and like Slaves, she also gets quite aggressive, moving close to the camera with sharp movements.




However, my main inspiration came from Black Honey themselves - particularly the lead singer, Izzy B Philips. She herself has an image reminiscent of Debbie Harry, glaring at the crowd moodily and keeping that sullen persona throughout the slower parts of the song, switching into a wilder version of herself during the chorus.

Digipak genre research

Digipak genre research from LucyHocart

Timeline of availability

Set Description - Living Room

MEADGATE AVENUE

LUCY'S LIVING ROOM

This location included normal living room furniture ( sofa, chairs, bookshelf), and for added dramatic effect, an old fashioned TV, plates and food waste, clothes and shoes, lighters, alcohol bottles, large stacks of magazines and cacti scattered across the floor. Again, this location worked really well, as due to the small size of the room, the camera was able to get in the whole set and allowed for a big variety of shots to be taken. 
It was easier to create the set for this as we were aiming for a realistically messy, lived-in feel, and already had all the components necessary to create this in the house.

Set Description - Green Screen Room

GREAT BADDOW HIGH SCHOOL,
GREEN SCREEN ROOM

This location included a pink sequin background draping round the whole room, with magazine cutouts and lyric cut outs stuck on the pink fabric. For our lighting, we used a large stage light, as we wanted a very glaring, spotlight feel for the scenes shot in the green screen room.

This location worked well for the singing scene, giving the intended feel of a glaring spotlight. The location was small enough for the camera to easily get the whole backdrop and the singer (me) in the shot with no green edges of the walls being shown. Due to its small size, we were able to get multiple different camera angle shots of the backdrop and show all the different aspects (the cutouts and quotes) with no green being shown. 
As the room is so small and had the door shut, there is no light or sound (although the on-set audio was removed during editing) pollution from outside sources, which made it easier to film what we needed in quick time without worrying about other people or objects getting into the frame unnoticed.

Class Feedback

	Strengths	Weaknesses	Suggestions
MUSIC VIDEO TEASER	Pretty, Psychedelic, good colours, unique, original look, links to colour theme of the band, trippy, suits genre, good kaleidoscope effect.	Swearing, Where is it going? long shots, too much kaleidoscope effect.	Is it too trippy? Is the artist accessible? Use more variety of shots? Use less kaleidoscope -  Maybe add some other effects (i.e. Noise) to add a crackly feel.
WEBSITE	Good background image, good colour scheme, good merch, clear that it is the band, links clearly with band image.	Do you want Lucy on the homepage?, too much kaleidoscope imagery, possibly more artist information added, quite dark.	Put interviews on too, possibly add a small biography, make the links stand out more to make it easier for the user to navigate.
DIGIPAK	Nice synergy, good trippy photos, clear unity, strong band image.	Too much kaleidoscope, quite dark images.	Think about including normal pictures as well, digitally lighten some pictures to make the digipak more colourful.
BRAND IMAGE, NAME, STAGE PRESENCE	Interesting ideas for name backgrounds, well thought out, clear image, logo links well, catchy/unique name, strong female characters, recognisable.	Don’t alienate too many people, are the band member images too similar?	Singer/producer is confusing, clear link between members, maybe give members more individuality.
TARGET AUDIENCE	Clear TA, clear marketing for audience, influenced from similar artists, good social media for TA.	Think about how to grab their interest, mainly targeting females?, could it be expanded?, how could people outside of TA be attracted?

Conventions of a Digipak

Conventions of a Digipak from Lucy Hocart

Halfway Evaluation

Halfway evaluation from Phoebe Hall

Storyboard Video

In this video, Phoebe explains the storyboard for our music video.

Cross media task

 

This is the website of solo artist Girli. Her music style is very eccentric, with a mix of rap/synth/punk. Her lyrics are extremely candid, with common themes of feminism and everyday teen life of drinking and partying. This is reflected all throughout the images shown on her website and the messy, collage layout.

Clicking on the "LIVE" page redirects the user to this page, which would usually show Girli's upcoming shows and give links to buy tickets. This page has a more simple background and layout, so as not to confuse the user.

Clicking on the "MERCH" page directs you to this page, which you can scroll down through and see various merchandise options. This includes a pin badge, hats, t-shirts and phone cases.

The individual icons also let you know how much a particular item costs and whether it is in or stock or not.

The background of this page gives the user more of an idea about Girli and her image/personality, showing a collage of various stylish looking girls and Girli herself. The page has a clear bright pink theme, which is a key part of Girli's look.

The Facebook, Twitter and Instagram links all take you through to Girli's social media pages. These pages contain personal posts/photos posted by Girli and links to new songs, events and tour dates, allowing fans to keep up to date with anything new.

Something extra that many artist websites don't have is a game - Girli's website has an added extra, this personalised PacMan which people can play by clicking on the PacMan link. This adds some extra excitement to the website, and is quite unusual - the only other artist website I have seen use this is Glass Animals, as they have a fruit machine feature on their official site.



Prop List - Living Room

Props used in living room shoot:
Glass bottles
Plate of food
Lighters
Magazines
CDs
VHS tapes
Television
Kaleidoscope glasses
Boots
Cacti

Costume moodboard - Coco

Costume moodboard - Bee

Prop List - Green Screen Room

Props used in green screen room shoot:
Microphone
Microphone stand
Heart-shaped glasses
Kaleidoscope glasses
Glitter